Gurren Lagann

Gurren Lagann
File:Gurren-english.png The logo of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann
Genre	Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Mecha, Sci-Fi
Anime
Directed by	Hiroyuki Imaishi
Studio	Gainax
Manga
Written by	Gainax (story), Kotaro Mori (art)
Published by	MediaWorks
Video game
Developer	Konami
Publisher	Konami
Platform	Nintendo DS
Anime
Studio	Gainax

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann (天元突破グレンラガン, Tengen Toppa Guren Ragan, lit. "Break-Through Heaven Gurren Lagann" or more loosely "Heaven Shattering Gurren Lagann") is a Japanese shōnen anime television series animated by Gainax and co-produced by Aniplex and Konami. It lasted for twenty-seven episodes and premiered on April 1 2007 on Japan's TV Tokyo network. It is directed by Hiroyuki Imaishi, written by veteran playwright Kazuki Nakashima and has been in development since the participation of the famed animator in the Abenobashi mecha themed episodes by the same studio. A video game based on the series, for the Nintendo DS was released in October 2007 bundled with a special episode of the anime series, and a theatrical feature is currently in production. Licensing for a North American release of Gurren Lagann was announced by ADV Films at AnimeExpo 2007 on June 30 2007. It was also announced for a UK release by ADV Films at AmeCon and by ADV Films Germany for a summer 2008 release.

Plot

Story

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann takes place in a fictional future where human beings have been forced underground and thrive in isolated subterranean civilizations on Earth. These "villages" have no contact with the surface world nor other villages. Since frequent earthquakes damage infrastructure, the villages must constantly expand deeper into the earth—individuals designated to this task are known as "diggers".

Giha Village is the home of Simon, a fourteen year old digger who was orphaned when his parents were killed in an earthquake. He is respected by the village elder as the best of the diggers, but is ostracized by his peers. After discovering a special drill key deep in the ground, he is recruited by an eccentric fellow orphan named Kamina into his group, the "Team Gurren". Kamina dreams of the surface world, which he visited as a child with his father but had to return home because he was too weak to survive.

After a failed attempt at reaching the surface, Kamina is jailed by the elder and Simon resumes digging, only to discover "a big face" deep in his tunnel. As he excitedly fetches Kamina to show him the discovery, he is caught by the village elder, but Kamina's punishment is interrupted by the ceiling of Giha Village collapsing as an enormous robot falls into the cavern. A girl named Yoko appears and tries to fight the robot with a large rifle, but initially cannot do much. Simon takes Kamina and Yoko to the "big face" he found earlier and discovers that the small drill key can be used to activate the small robot, which he uses to end up destroying the much larger robot and effectively break through to the surface.

It is on the surface that Simon and Kamina discover that there are more large robots known as Gunmen piloted by "Beastmen" that terrorize the surface dwellers during the day. Simon and Kamina help Yoko and her village destroy three more Gunmen and Kamina takes one for himself, naming it Gurren. Eventually, Simon and Kamina decide that they will go on a journey to end the constant struggle between Beastmen and humans. Simon and Kamina are initially accompanied by Yoko and a mechanic from Yoko's village named Leeron as they head out to find the Beastmen's Human Eradication Army main head-quarters, while dealing with various Beastmen warriors, including the vicious Viral.

Along the way, Simon and the others are joined by more humans, including the "Black Siblings", led by Kittan, and Rossiu, a strict young man from an underground village, forming the "Team Dai-Gurren", leading up to a major battle with the Human Eradication Army which results in the death of Kamina, the arrival of Nia, the mysterious "daughter" of Beastman leader, Lord Genome, and the population of Earth's surface.

The second half of the series moves seven years into the future, where mankind has become prosperous and led by Simon and the other members of the Team Dai-Gurren. Though all seems well, after 1,000,000 people populate the surface, a new catastrophe begins with the arrival of the Anti-Spirals, including Nia's sudden "transformation" into the Anti-Spiral's messenger, and the threat of the moon literally falling onto the Earth. Simon, along with the reformed Team and former enemy, Viral, now lead the battle to defeat the Anti-Spirals and save Earth.

Principal characters

Main articles: List of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann primary characters, List of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann secondary characters, and List of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann antagonists

Simon (シモン, Shimon)

Voiced by: Tetsuya Kakihara (Japanese); Josh Grelle (English), Takayuki Sugo (epilogue)

Simon is a fourteen year-old digger from Giha village. Although he is initially looked down because of it, Simon excels at drilling through the underground, while the drill itself quickly becomes his trademark symbol. One day, he finds a mysterious drill-shaped item, which is later revealed to be the key for a head-shaped robot he also finds buried in the soil. With the help of the robot, Kamina, and Yoko, he fights off a Gunmen who broke into the village. While finishing the Gunmen off with a drill-like attack, they reach the surface world.

Kamina (カミナ, Kamina)

Voiced by: Katsuyuki Konishi (Japanese); Brett Weaver (English)

Kamina is a young man from Giha village who dreams of leaving the village and go to the surface, which he saw as a kid. He's very passionate about his goals, expressing his wishes through energetic speeches, which seems to affect all those who hear him. He convinces Simon to help him with his plan to drill through the roof of the village and get to the world above, but the plan failed and he was put in prison. He left the village shortly thereafter with the help of Simon and a young girl named Yoko, as a result of fighting a Gunmen, who broke into the village from the surface. His plans are rarely well thought-out but for some strange reason or another, they seem to work most of the time.

Yoko Ritona (ヨーコ・リットナー, Yōko Rittonā)

Voiced by: Marina Inoue (Japanese); Tiffany Grant (English)

Yoko is a girl from Giha's neighboring village Ritona, who had been chasing the Gunmen which entered Giha village. She wields an extensive range of firearms and has previous experience fighting Gunmen. She uses her marksmanship from afar to assist Kamina and Simon, while they pilot their respective Gunmen. Although she is said to be around the same age as Simon, she is much more mature (mentally and physically). She also is one of the most rational of the group. She loves Kamina.

Nia Teppelin (ニア・テッペリン, Nia Tepperin)

Voiced by: Yukari Fukui (Japanese); Luci Christian (English)

Nia is a mysterious young girl found by Simon sleeping in a capsule in the middle of a dump site. She has had no prior contact with humans except her father. She is very curious, pure and innocent, because of growing up sheltered in a peaceful environment, away from all the battles occurring in the outside world. During her travels with Team Gurren, she discovers the harsh reality of the world and becomes very close to Simon.

Terminology

Beastmen

File:G-L - Beastmen Kingdom.jpg

The Beastmen Generals

Beastmen are non-Spiral Beings, created and cloned by Lord Genome to fight by piloting Gunmen. The numerous animals on the planet are previously failed experiments, thus they lack the intelligence that Beastmen have. Beastmen and many other animals found on the planet cannot sexually reproduce, and instead multiply solely via cloning.

File:Gurren Lagann - Generic Ganmen.jpg

Generic Gunmen

Gunmen

Main article: List of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann mecha

Gunmen (ガンメン, Ganmen) are the type of mecha used in the series. The name itself as a whole means "face" and can be broken down into "gun" and "man" —- unsurprisingly, the mecha themselves are centered around faces. Gunmen sport a variety of weaponry: primitive models only use large clubs or bare hands, while more advanced units use solid or beam weapons. Gunmen powered by the "Spiral Energy" inherent in humans' DNA are much more powerful than those piloted by Beastmen.

Spiral Energy

In the series' concept, Spiral Energy is the power of evolution, generated by beings capable of doing so, like humans and other DNA-based animals, whose spiral molecular structure allows them to get stronger through the generations. Beastmen, because they can not reproduce naturally, cannot evolve and thus are unable to produce Spiral Energy. The amount of Spiral Energy produced by an individual may vary and is based not only on its own limitations, but also by its own will to survive and persevere. Spiral Energy has both infinite potential and infinite applications - it has been known to regenerate or grow new mecha parts on a galactic scale, and even create tunnels through both space and time.

Spiral Energy is specifically stated to defy the conservation of energy, which in addition to explaining the creation of mass that is practically constant during battles, also carries the danger that if Spiral Energy is overused, it will cause the universe to collapse into a massive black hole. This event will be known as the Spiral Nemesis, and is the reason why the antagonistic Anti-Spirals are against the use of Spiral Energy.

Anti-Spirals

Eons before the story begins, a certain race evolved enough to expand and prosper across the stars through the use of their Spiral Energy. However, discovering that this limitless evolution would one day cause the destruction of the entire universe called "Spiral Nemesis", they abandoned the use of Spiral Energy and sealed their bodies in their home planet, ceasing to evolve at all, and just relying on the highly advanced technology they obtained through all this time, becoming the Anti-Spirals. As the name implies, they also began to oppose other civilizations whose Spiral Energy could become a further threat to the universe, if left unchecked. As the Spiral Energy comes from the will of its users, the Anti-Spirals tend to employ fearsome tactics to bring their enemies into despair and sap them of the very source of Spiral Energy: their hope. The Anti-Spirals also tend to spare their enemies if they surrender, but not before implanting measures of control to prevent them from rising again in the future, causing their ultimate destruction in this case.

Media

Anime

See also: List of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann episodes

Produced by the animation studio Gainax and directed by Hiroyuki Imaishi. Gurren Lagann first aired in Japan on TV Tokyo on April 1 2007 and the last episode first aired on September 30 2007. The anime has twenty-seven episodes plus two specials, the first being the uncensored version of the sixth episode, and the second is episode 5.5, a bonus that came with the Nintendo DS's game. The anime received an Excellence Prize at the 2007 Japan Media Arts Festival, and its director received an individual award at the twelfth Animation Kobe Festival.

On December 11 2007, a Gurren Lagann-based design submitted from Norway won The Daily Telegraph's contest to update the British Union Flag by incorporating the Welsh Dragon. In 2008, the anime received both "best television production" and "best character design" from the Tokyo International Anime Fair.

2channel incident

Takami Akai, the producer of the series and a co-founder of Gainax, announced that he would resign his position effective episode five, which aired on April 29 2007, over comments that he made regarding posts on the Japanese Internet forum 2channel. Akai and another Gainax employee, Keiko Mimori, made disparaging remarks about comments criticizing the animation style of the fourth episode of Gurren Lagann, which was completely directed by guest and friend Osamu Kobayashi. With regard to reading the fan criticisms, Akai stated that it was "like putting [his] face next to an anus and breathing deeply." Fans later became aware of his comments, and he announced his departure from the company he helped to found.

Music

Opening theme

"Sky Blue Days" (空色デイズ, Sorairo Deizu) by Shōko Nakagawa

(From episode seventeen onwards, the opening featured the second verse of the same song.)

Ending themes

1. "Underground" by High Voltage (1–15)
2. "Happily ever after" by Shōko Nakagawa (16)
3. "Everyone's Peace" (みんなのピース, Minna no Pīsu) by Afromania (17–27)

Manga

The Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann manga, illustrated by Kotaro Mori, started serialization in the Japanese shōnen magazine Dengeki Comic Gao! on April 27 2007, published by MediaWorks. The first bound volume was released on September 27 2007, containing the first five chapters, and is published under MediaWorks' Dengeki Comics label. The story of the manga follows the same plotline as the anime, however, there are several changes to the layout of events, and the addition of backstories that essentially fills in gaps from the anime, such as the relationship between Dayakka and Kiyoh.

Video games

An online video game was developed by Konami called Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann Chōzetsu Hakkutsu ONLINE (天元突破グレンラガン 超絶発掘ONLINE, literally "Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann: Superior Excavation Online"). Beta testing had ended on April 16 2007. The player takes up the role of a driller and drills for treasures in first person view. There is a shop to purchase drills—the shopkeeper is an original character named Asaki. The player can also collect digital trading cards. The game was canceled at the closed beta stage, as installing the game crashed Windows indefinitely. Konami even had to send out 500GB external hard drives to beta users so that they could back up files while reinstalling their broken operating systems.

A game for the Nintendo DS was released October 25 2007, not only featuring the characters from the series, but also containing a special episode set in the early stages of the story as a pre-order bonus.

Movie

The Japanese Newtype magazine released on March 10 2008 by Kadokawa Shoten will announce a Gurren Lagann movie.

External links

• Gurren Lagann's official website Template:Ja icon
• Gainax's Gurren Lagann website Template:Ja icon
• Konami's Gurren Lagann website Template:Ja icon
• Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann ({{{type}}}) at Anime News Network's encyclopedia